Winter Bike Maintnence

This time of year can have very finicky weather. It could be darn cold, or not so cold, or there could be two feet of snow on the ground--like there is now.

The majority of us are not riding in these snowy and icy conditions, with the exception of the unhuman sport tourers. This is a perfect time to do some bike maintnence that no one wants to do when it's prime riding season. The first step is to have a decent work place. If you have a garage or access to one definatly use this oppurtunity. A nice accomodation for a garage is some kind of space heater to create a little bit of comfort for your work space. If you do not have this luxury, use your driveway or whatever. Check the weather and look for a gap of sunny weather for a day or two so you can get your project finished.

After your bike is in the garage or sitting in that shovled out space on your front deck, come up with a list of things that you want to get accomplished. This can be very basic stuff such as tire pressure, chain slack, oil, whatever. It could even be a front end swap, you never know!

Here is a fairly solid list of things to go over and look into while you're working on the bike:
Tire Pressure
Chain Tension and lubrication
Oil Level/Change it
Fork Seals
Steering Bearing and Components
Electrical Grounds
Valve Adjustment- very important, if you do not know the last time this was done look into it
Wheel Bearings
Going over the entire bike to make sure it is safe and sound

Different bikes require different types and amounts of maintnence. It is very important to make sure your valves are within the proper gap to ensure engine life and performance. It is not overly complicated, just do your homework first. Make sure you have the right tools and numbers to adjust them properly.

Don't forget the basic stuff either. It is easy to overlook proper chain maintnence and tire maintnence, but it is so easy.

A Reflection on Today's Ride

After walking Anna (who is a dog, who is not mine but I am around her alot), I realized that today is a good day to go try out my new knee sliders. I have previously touched my knee to the ground when turning aggresivley, and decided to get some sliders to capitalize on this possible skill I might be developing; what a hootinany these things are!

The temp today was in the high 30's so of course I was bundled up. I actually discovered that my winter coat liner works well under my leather jacket to insulate and also repel the wind. Anyway, I hopped on the bike and headed over to The Sisters. The bottom turn is still tear-jerkingly wet and slick with gravel and frozen stuff everywhere. I did a warm up lap to heat up my tires, and also get that nasty goop off of them. After briskly turning around after the top left turn, I was going back through that same turn and into my favorite left. TOUCHDOWN!!!!! on my first try.

I have had much practice on this turn and also through this entire section, and have touch my knee on this turn before. I did a few more laps, turning around just before the bottom turn because it's all wet anyway. I stayed here until my legs started cramping up and decided to head back.

When I got back into town (joppatowne) there was some catastrophe on Joppa Farm and I had to turn around. I figured that I would stop and get gas since I had to go by there anyway. While gasing up, I could have sworn that Rudolph passed by on his scooter, but he wasn't going towards his house so I figured it was some other stand up citizen.

I took a detour to get home, which didn't get me home, so I had to turn around again. While going through the hood near the highschool, I decided to do some hooligan maneuvers and drag my knees a bit in some cauldesacks ( however you spell it). I then hit up a freshly paved parkinglot at Joppa Elementary, then when finally getting to my neck of the woods, I did a few circles in the lil loop by Justin's house. Fun stuff!

Thanks for reading, until next time stay safe and warm out there!

Sweet Dragon Slayin' Vid

This video is of one of the original photographers at the killboy blog. Since we talked about knee dragging skills check this video out to see a perspective of knee dragging beyond the round-a-bout.

Following my BFF through the Dragon from killboy on Vimeo.